Hunter counts the cost of flood as rain eases

By Jeannette McMahon (online producer )

After days of downpours the rain has finally eased across the Hunter, although flood warnings are still in place for the Williams and Paterson rivers. With the Upper Hunter declared a natural disaster zone, councils across the region are turning their attention to infrastructure damage and the substantial cost to fix it.

It was a case of battening down the hatches and riding out the storm for residents of the Hunter Region yesterday and last night, as drenching rain, localised flooding and wild gusts of wind forced schools to close, cut many roads and ripped boats from their moorings.

Dozens of people were airlifted from a remote area near Cessnock after they were isolated by floodwaters, and motorists trying to travel north on the Pacific Highway found it closed in several places.

Today massive potholes on the New England Highway are causing chaos and damaging car tyres and suspension, after large sections of the road were damaged by heavy rain and flooding between Muswellbrook and Aberdeen.

Muswellbrook police have set up 40km/h zones to slow traffic down, and the RTA has sent work crews to repair the highway.

Meanwhile several local schools are closed due to the flooding.

Vacy Public and Paterson Public schools will not open today, as access roads are still cut by floodwaters, and St Joseph's primary school at Dungog is also closed.

Local resident Norman Cone, whose father Alec Cone had one of the bridges named after him, described to 1233's Jill Emberson how it felt to see the structure washed away.

"I feel a bit depressed about the bridge," he says.

"It's been here for 50-odd years."

Aside from the sentiment involved with the bridge, it was also the only access to Norman's property and he remains cut off, with his wife even unable to get to a scheduled doctor's appointment.

It's uncertain how long it will take to replace the bridge, with the natural disaster funding no guarantee of speedy infrastructure repairs.

General manager of the Upper Hunter Shire Council, Daryl Dutton, told Jill the bureaucratic process can be a lengthy one.

"At the moment we're in an emergency response period so we can go out and do some emergency works, but we're unable to do any permanent restoration until we get the formal approvals, and that could take some weeks," he says.